The buzz of blow dryers and hum of small talk fill Rhonda Calahan’s Sarasota salon most days — until her phone rings. She doesn’t hesitate. She sets down her scissors, wipes her hands and answers, her tone soft but urgent.
On the other end might be a woman whispering from a locked bathroom, a mother searching for a safe place to sleep or a survivor trying to decide if it’s finally time to leave.
“I am the hotline,” Calahan said. “My phone can ring anytime, day or night. I always answer.”
Calahan runs Queens of Domestic Violence and Awareness, a small nonprofit organization she launched to help survivors find safety, counseling and support. For Calahan, the mission is personal. Fifteen years ago, an ex-boyfriend nearly killed her after she tried to end their relationship. The scars — physical and emotional — still drive her to pick up the phone today.
Her work meets a pressing need in Sarasota and Manatee counties, where law enforcement recorded an average of nearly 2,600 domestic violence cases annually over the past decade. Experts say the real number is far higher, since many incidents are never reported to the police.
Calahan’s approach is intimate by design. If a survivor has nowhere to stay, she books a hotel for a few nights, provides essentials and connects them with longer-term partners such as Safe Place and Rape Crisis Center, or SPARCC, a Sarasota-based nonprofit organization that serves survivors of domestic violence and sexual assault. Once clients are stable, Queens invites them to join a support group led by a licensed therapist — an eight-week program that runs throughout the year.
It’s not a high-budget operation or a government-backed program but a lifeline born of empathy — a woman who answers her phone, no matter the hour, because she knows what silence can cost.
Mandy O’Malley, director of community outreach at Resilient Retreat, a Sarasota-based nonprofit organization that works with survivors of abuse and the professionals that help them, said grassroots partners like Queens of Domestic Violence and Awareness play a vital role in reaching those who might never contact a larger agency.
“We don’t need to be territorial,” O’Malley said. “Unfortunately, there’s plenty of work for all of us to do and help support people’s mental well-being. It’s not about the ego of the individual organization or provider. It’s about the client and the community, and we serve them best when we work together.”
From victim to survivor
On a sunny afternoon in February 2012, Calahan pulled into the driveway of her Sarasota home after lunching with a friend and noticed her ex-boyfriend waiting there. She didn’t think much of it; they’d been arguing about ending the relationship, but she never imagined what would follow.
When she walked through the door, he followed close behind.
She sat down in a chair as he reached out and brushed her cheek — a gesture that turned violent in an instant. He slapped her hard across the face. The chair toppled backward, her head slammed against the wall and the home she knew became a crime scene.
The man she had once hoped to marry dragged her by her clothes into the kitchen and yanked open a drawer. He grabbed the first knife he saw — a dull one — and pressed it to her neck, trying to slice. She threw up her hands to block him, and he slashed them instead, slicing through her fingers as she fought him off.
Then he reached for a sharper knife. That’s when the stabbing began — wild and unrelenting, the blade plunging into her arms, chest and back as she screamed for help and begged him to stop.
Pinned beneath him, Calahan prayed out loud, calling on Jesus to spare her life. She thought she was alone — until her son’s then-girlfriend, who had heard the commotion from a back bedroom, emerged and asked what was going on. But the stabbing continued until the girl fled through the front door.
That brief distraction was enough. The man got off Calahan and she was able to escape outside, where she collapsed in her neighbor’s yard.
By the time the helicopter lifted her toward a trauma center in Bradenton, Calahan had been stabbed 30 times — in her chest, arms and back. Miraculously, none of the wounds had severed a major vein or artery.
Her attacker was later convicted of attempted murder and is now serving a 30-year prison sentence.
Out of the pain came conviction: If she had lived, it was for a purpose.
“God kept me here for a reason,” she said. “I didn’t want to sit down and do nothing. I wanted to help other women, because I’ve been there. I know how important it is to have somebody there for you at that time.”
Turning trauma into support
At first, Calahan didn’t know what shape her mission would take. She began by volunteering with SPARCC, helping survivors who came into the shelter or courtrooms and offering comfort where she could.
She also told her story publicly in a YouTube video posted five years after the attack — a raw, emotional recounting that paired her words with images of the bloody crime scene and the scars she still carried. The video spread quickly online, reaching other survivors and garnering media attention.
The response convinced Calahan she could do more. In 2019, she filed paperwork for her own 501(c)(3) nonprofit — Queens of Domestic Violence and Awareness. The organization has since grown into a small community of its own.
Queens now includes a four-member board and 17 volunteers, many of them survivors themselves. They help organize fundraisers, deliver care packages and share Calahan’s message of second chances. Despite operating on a modest annual budget, Queens continues to reach people who might otherwise fall through the cracks.
One of those survivors is Cierra Capco, who first met Calahan as a teenage client in her salon. When Capco later became trapped in an abusive relationship, she said, she didn’t feel comfortable calling a large agency for help. But when she learned Calahan was forming a small church support group for survivors, she decided to reach out.
Opening up to someone from her own community — and someone who had survived similar trauma — made it easier for Capco to seek help. The conversations that followed became a turning point.
After her abuser’s release from prison, Capco returned to the relationship for a time, a pattern that advocates say is common among survivors. But she continued staying in touch with Calahan and the group, finding steady encouragement to make choices that would protect her and her three children.
In the four years since leaving her abuser for good, Capco has put her family on a better path. Though the emotional weight of the past still lingers, she said seeing her children happy and thriving in a stable home has been its own kind of healing.
“My kids watched me for 12 years be unhappy, and because I was unhappy, obviously it was hard for them to be happy,” she said. “It’s a relief to see them happy again — because I’m doing all the things I wasn’t doing four years ago, from sleeping in a car to having a home, a small one, but a home, where they can feel safe.”
A growing community of hope
Now, Capco serves as a secretary on the Queens of Domestic Violence board, saying it was Calahan’s open arms that gave her a newfound sense of freedom within herself and to help others.
Getting the word out in a small town is hard, Capco said, but not impossible.
Queens partners with local organizations to display information in community spaces, posts flyers in salons and libraries and uses social media to reach women who may be suffering in silence. The team is even exploring discreet ways to distribute pamphlets in public restrooms — places where survivors might find them privately.
The more awareness they build, the more resources they can offer. Queens operates on a modest annual budget of about $10,000, funded entirely through family, friends and community donors, including the William G. and Marie Selby Foundation and the Community Foundation of Sarasota County. Fundraisers like an annual black-tie gala help keep the lights on and the phone line open.
Capco said community support has been steady but believes the organization is only beginning to tap into its potential. “Our message and mission aren’t as widespread as they could be,” she said, “but I see tremendous potential as we continue to partner with larger organizations and expand our network.”
For Calahan, the work has already expanded far beyond logistics or outreach. It’s become a ministry. In the years since the attack, she’s shared her story with young women across the region, hoping they will hear what she once ignored — that quiet, internal warning that something isn’t right.
She tells them not just about the violence she endured, but about the clarity that followed and the moment she realized survival came with responsibility.
Today, as a certified victim advocate, Calahan spends her days listening, guiding and praying with women who remind her of her younger self — the one who believed she could love someone into changing.
“I know what it feels like, because I’ve been there,” she said. “I know what it’s like going through a domestic violence situation. I know how important it is to have somebody there for you at that time when you’re going through that so I always want to get back in here for the women.”
If you or someone you know is in crisis, you can call Florida's Domestic Violence Hotline at 1-800-500-1119. You can also contact the National Domestic Violence Hotline at 1-800-799-7233 or text BEGIN to 88788. Calahan's 24-hour hotline is 941-549-3827.
Clinton Engelberger is a contributor to Suncoast Searchlight, a nonprofit newsroom of the Community News Collaborative serving Sarasota, Manatee, and DeSoto counties. Learn more at suncoastsearchlight.org.
This story was originally published by Suncoast Searchlight, a nonprofit newsroom delivering investigative journalism to Sarasota, Manatee, and DeSoto counties. Learn more at suncoastsearchlight.org.
